Bella's fingers slide through her wet hair like little fish swimming down a river. Combs caught and brushed pulled; a servitor's hands were the best tools for any beautician, and Bella's hands were artisan. She reaches up to her scalp and pulls down in gentle, rippling waves of motion that send soothing tingles down her head and neck as she works. Her fingers hunt down the beginnings of knots with the tenacity of a trained assassin and pull them into smooth alignment with only the gentlest of tugs. Not so much as a single strand pulls loose. 

"I am aware of the issue, Captain." she growls.

The towel draped across her shoulders is her only concession to modesty. The soft plipping of water rolling off her body onto her chair fills her ears with each fresh pull through her hair. When she tosses it all behind her, it slaps against her back with a wet thwack that calls to mind the cracking of a whip. She almost doesn't flinch. She almost doesn't cross her legs so gingerly and pull them up tighter against her body. 

She almost manages to feel smooth, confident, and poised. But she is not Empress Nero. Her eyes flicker over the captain's rippling, lifelike armor. More than a match for any dress Bella's ever touched in her life. She clicks her tongue and reaches up behind her head to start tying back her hair. Someone else would use another... a servant for this, but not her. This work is too delicate to be left to a faker or a hack. Bit by bit, she weaves tiny rings of braids into the cascade of hair down her back. Delicate little chains that crisscross around and constrain the fury of a blue-black waterfall.

"I hope you realize how stupid you sound. 'He's a problem. I'll dispose of him of you wish it, Praetor.' You know, Odoacer plays games just like this. You wanna push him into committing some sort of insult at dinner and then shove him out an airlock? I'm sure Hades loves technicalities like that."

Bella rises up out of her chair and pulls the down across her body to start patting the rest of herself dry. Where it passes, her skin glistens and her fur shines radiant and fluffy white. Her tail curls and flicks behind her in apparent pleasure. But her legs draw in close together. Every bend she makes is carefully choreographed to angle certain parts of her body away from prying owl eyes. She lets the towel drop completely and turns her back on Lorventi, stepping toward her closet and staring thoughtfully at the outfits hanging there awaiting her pleasure. 

"...He won't be a problem," she says with a glance over her shoulder, "And even if he is, I can hold the chain together. Put it out of your head, got it? Her Imperial Majesty's word is law: humanity is a precious treasure. We'll deliver him into her love as it suits our schedule."

The air inside the [i]Anemoi[/i] has a permanent chill to it. That's the only reason for the shiver that runs down her body. Nothing else.